BostonPocketPC

At MIX10 today, Microsoft unveiled the long awaited developer platform for the upcoming Windows Phone 7 Series devices. Windows Phone 7 Series was announced by Steve Ballmer at Mobile World Congress last month with devices to be available for sale by holiday 2010.

Mobile development for Windows Phone 7 will take advantage of both Silverlight 4 (the full version not a watered down “Lite” version) and the XNA Framework for games that is used both on the Zune,Windows (Vista and 7) and Xbox 360 Platform. This will provide a rich environment for both internet based applications and game development. As expected, Windows Phone 7 will use The Marketplace to deliver applications to the device and providing developers with a 70% revenue share for applications sold. Development fees will be waived for students who are members of the DreamSpark program.

Perhaps the single best piece of news is that Microsoft has listened to the developer community and will be providing Windows Phone Developer tools for free. Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone,Windows Phone 7 Series add-in to use with Visual Studio 2010 RC, XNA Game Studio 4.0,and a Windows Phone 7 Series Emulator for application testing will be available as a single download from http://developer.windowsphone.com. Expression Blend for Windows Phone Community Technology Preview will be made available as a separate download.

(Note: to run these you will need Windows Vista or Windows 7)

Windows Phone development starts with a single download of tools, runtimes, and phone emulator. The end-to-end application development environment includes a familiar Visual Studio IDE, Windows Phone Marketplace, and optionally Expression Blend. The supported runtimes are Silverlight, XNA Framework, and .NET Compact Framework. The application platform is running on Windows Phone OS 7.0 CTP, which is focused on the consumer, the information they care about, and entertainment experiences.

The following sections provide the information you need to build Windows Phone applications:

• Application Platform Overview for Windows Phone
• Getting Started Guide for Developing for Windows Phone
• Code Samples for Windows Phone
• Silverlight Application Development for Windows Phone
• XNA Game Development for Windows Phone
• Windows Phone Developer Tools CTP
• Programming Guide for Windows Phone
• Class Library Reference for Windows Phone 

You can watch or download the 1st Day keynote of MIX10 on demand here.

Full Press Release:

LAS VEGAS, March 15 – Today at MIX10, Microsoft Corp. showcased advancements in its platform technologies that enable the developer and designer community to deliver compelling user experiences across a broad set of devices. Building on the excitement of the recently announced Windows® Phone 7 Series, Scott Guthrie, corporate vice president, .NET Developer Platform, and Joe Belfiore, corporate vice president, Windows Phone Program Management, detailed the opportunity for developers to use proven technologies such as Microsoft Silverlight and the XNA Framework to build new mobile applications and 3-D Games.

“As the browser, server, Web and devices evolve, a focus on delivering consistently great user experiences has become paramount,” Guthrie said. “By extending our familiar platform technologies and tools to phones, Microsoft is delivering the premier application development experience across a variety of devices and form factors.”

End-to-End Application Development Platform for Windows Phone 7 Series

During the keynote, Microsoft provided the first deep dive into Windows Phone 7 Series application development. By combining Silverlight features for rich application development and the XNA Framework for games, Windows Phone 7 Series empowers millions of developers and designers to build visually stunning and immersive applications and games — one of the industry’s most profitable mobile application categories — while taking advantage of device-specific capabilities. Specifically, developers will be able to take advantage of the following features:

• Accelerometer, an intuitive control that responds to motion
• A Microsoft Location Service to provide developers with a single point of reference to acquire location information
• Microsoft Notification Service for pushing information to the phone, regardless of whether or not an application is running
• Hardware-accelerated video with digital rights management (DRM)
• Internet Information Services Smooth Streaming for the industry’s highest quality content viewing experience
• Multitouch
• Camera and microphone support

“Windows Phone 7 Series brings together a rich application environment, powerful hardware, a fresh approach to software and a smart new design,” Belfiore said. “It was designed to generate incredible opportunities for developers and designers to quickly and easily deliver compelling applications and games. With the best developer tools, an established ecosystem and marketplace, and a path for developers to use their Silverlight and XNA Framework skill sets, we are delivering an application platform that is simple, powerful and inspiring.”

Free Tools for Windows Phone 7 Series Developers and Designers

To further support an end-to-end development experience, Microsoft announced the availability of comprehensive tools support for Windows Phone 7 Series. The easy-to-install package includes previews of the following:

• Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone
• Windows Phone 7 Series add-in to use with Visual Studio 2010 RC
• XNA Game Studio 4.0
• Windows Phone 7 Series Emulator for application testing
• Expression Blend for Windows Phone Community Technology Preview (available as a separate download)

A Marketplace for Windows Phone 7 Series Applications

Microsoft also showed how developers and designers will be able to bring applications and games to market with a new Windows Phone Marketplace. The Marketplace features a panoramic design and active merchandising to increase the discoverability of games and applications, and supports one-time credit card purchases, mobile operator billing and advertising-funded applications. The Marketplace will also enable customers to try applications before buying them and allow developers to cross-promote their applications through deep linking.

Several leading companies will be creating exciting applications and games for Windows Phone 7 Series. They include The Associated Press, Archetype International Inc., AWS Convergence Technologies – WeatherBug, Citrix Systems Inc., Clarity Consulting Inc., Cypress Consulting, EA Mobile, Fandango Inc., Foursquare Labs Inc., frog design inc., Glu Mobile Inc., Graphic.ly, Hudson Entertainment Inc., IdentityMine Inc., IMDb.com Inc., Larva Labs, Match.com LLC, Matchbox Mobile Ltd., Microsoft Game Studios, Namco Networks America Inc., Oberon Media Inc., Pageonce Inc., Pandora Media Inc., Photobucket Inc., PopCap Games Inc., Seesmic, Shazam Entertainment Ltd., Sling Media, SPB Software Inc., stimulant, TeleCommunications Systems Inc., Touchality LLC and Vertigo Software Inc.

Continued Innovation With Silverlight and Expression Blend

Microsoft announced a release candidate (RC) for Silverlight 4, available for download today, which builds on the beta version released at the Professional Developers Conference in November 2009. The Silverlight 4 RC provides powerful media and enterprise application and media capabilities, out-of-browser flexibility and world-class tools support via Visual Studio and Expression Blend with Sketchflow to enable robust application development and rich interactive experiences.

In addition, Microsoft unveiled the Expression Blend 4 Beta, a design and development workflow tool. New features such as Path Layout enable developers and designers to build and animate innovative user interface design via a groundbreaking visual layout mechanism, without the need to write code. Expression Blend 4 Beta also adds support for Silverlight 4, .NET Framework 4 and Visual Studio 2010.

Silverlight Customer Adoption

Silverlight adoption has continued at a rapid pace with installations approaching 60 percent of all Internet devices worldwide — an increase of nearly 15 percentage points in just four months. Customers such as Major League Soccer, BBC, eBay Inc., Netflix Inc., NBCOlympics.com and CT Corp., a Wolters Kluwer business, demonstrated how they are taking advantage of the power of Silverlight to deliver compelling consumer and enterprise experiences.

“Microsoft Silverlight technology will be the backbone of the video platform on our newly launched MLSsoccer.com,” said Chris Schlosser, director of digital strategy for Major League Soccer. “Our work with Microsoft allows us to launch cutting-edge digital and mobile experiences for our loyal fans. As part of our increased focus on digital media, we view a rich video experience as absolutely critical to accomplishing our goal of ’super serving’ MLS supporters.”

All the latest news and links from MIX10 are available at http://live.visitmix.com/press.

We will be having our next Boston/New England Windows Mobile User and Developer Groups on Wednesday, March 17th beginning at 6:30 PM at the Microsoft offices (201 Jones Road, 6th Floor) in Waltham, MA.

Among the topics discussed -

• A wrap-up of MIX 2010. We will be talking about what was announced about Windows Phone 7 and the developer story

See you all there!

While we discussed this at our January Windows Mobile User and Developer Group meeting, I wanted to send along a reminder to all that there will be no Boston/New England Windows Mobile User/Developer Group meeting for February.

We are still on track for our March meeting, however. This will be held on Wednesday, March 17th. Details on the agenda are yet to be determined.

We will be having our next Boston/New England Windows Mobile User and Developer Groups on Wednesday, January 20th beginning at 6:30 PM at the Microsoft offices (201 Jones Road, 6th Floor) in Waltham, MA.

Among the topics discussed -

• A wrap-up of CES 2010. Lots of interesting things going on.
• Hands-on with the LG eXpo. If you haven’t seen this Windows Phone device in action, you are in for a treat!

See you all there!

‘Tis the season! In place of our normal Boston/New England Windows Mobile User and Developer Group meeting, we will be having a casual holiday get-together. We will be meeting at the Bison County BBQ and Grille, located at 275 Moody Street in Waltham, MA.

We will plan on being there starting at 6:00 PM on Wednesday, December 16th. No formal agenda; just good food, good conversation and friends!

We hope to see you there!

I thought I would pass along a “good news/bad news” experience I recently had with regards to Windows Mobile 6.5, the .NET Compact Framework 3.5 and ActiveSync. Hopefully, it might serve to help someone in avoiding some coding and testing frustration.

I have been working on a project that requires responding to new incoming messages on Windows Mobile 6.5 devices. Fortunately, the State and Notification Broker API (“SNAPI”) made this simple enough. Now, my C# code needed to play a sound if certain conditions were met. Simple enough – the System.Media.SoundPlayer class in the .NET CF 3.5 would do the trick. Once the code was written, it was time to test.

The first test went according to plan. Use an emulator, deploy in debugging mode, set a breakpoint to ensure that I was hitting the correct branches in application logic and run with it. Sure enough, everything performed as expected. The next test was essentially the same, with the exception being connecting an actual Windows Mobile 6.5 device for testing. Again, there were no problems.

For the next test, I decided to remove the breakpoint in Visual Studio. I run the code and… no sound. My intellectual response - “WTF?!?!?”

I’ll keep the story brief here, omitting all the second-guessing and testing that went on up until my finally figuring out the root cause of the problem. The issue, as it turns out, is that -

• SNAPI and the .NET Compact Framework 3.5 work very well. By “well”, I mean “fast”, especially when running on the latest hardware with Windows Mobile 6.5.
• ActiveSync runs… well… about as fast as it always has on Windows Mobile, despite OS and hardware improvements.

Keeping in mind that ActiveSync and my application run on different threads, here is what I was able to determine:

• ActiveSync begins a synchronization operation. As part of this sync, a new email arrives. Based upon device settings, ActiveSync prepares to play a sound and grabs resources.
• At around the same time, my application receives the notification from the broker about a change in the unread email count changing. My logic has to do quite a bit of processing, but still managed to get to the point of playing a sound while ActiveSync still had a hold on resources. Result – my sound wouldn’t play.

“Fine”, I thought, “This is strictly a timing issue.” When I was in debugging mode, the stepping through the code and the latency associated with running in debug mode gave enough time for ActiveSync to complete. As a result, I decided to add code to pause my code to give time for ActiveSync to release resources. Here is where the real surprise came into play.

I spent quite a bit of time tinkering with the amount of time my application had to sleep in order to be able to play my sound. It took upwards of ten seconds for ActiveSync to release the resource I needed. When you consider the fact that ActiveSync had a “head start” on my code (AS was the cause of the SNAPI event firing, mind you), the amount of time from start to finish for AS was, well, A LOT. Ten seconds?!? Needless to say, I was very surprised and disappointed. This wouldn’t have surprised me a few years back, when slower hardware and slower network speeds could be the culprits. But today? With faster hardware and networks?

I guess the moral of this story is… If you are coding for Windows Mobile with a dependency on ActiveSync, NEVER assume performance. Code for the worst case and hope to be pleasantly surprised.

As someone who spends a great deal of time writing and speaking about technology, I am regularly asked by technology companies to write or speak about their products. Over the years, I have established a number of relationships with companies as a result. While I have generally had good relationships with these companies, I am finding more frequently that the relationship between companies and myself with regards to my role as a “technology communicator” is becoming strained. In some cases, the relationships are strained to the proverbial “breaking point”. This is why I have decided to write what follows.

In the spirit of openness and communication, I think it only fair that I write an Open Letter to all the companies that I currently do work with, as well as though that might wish to work with me. I do this in the hope that we can establish better and more positive interactions that benefit each other as well as (and perhaps more importantly) those in the public who both read and listen to my words about your products.

If you are a current or potential “partner” with me and find yourself taking offense in any way by what follows, please take a sincere moment of pause and honestly ask yourself why you feel this way. I hope that my writing may in some way cause you reflect and react in a positive way for yourselves, your other partners in the community and ultimately those in the general public whose acceptance you hope to gain.

Dear Sirs/Madams,

I write to you today with regards to your desire to have me write and/or speak about your product(s). I thank you for your consideration in this manner. In order to affect a more positive and effective relationship with your company, I ask that you take a moment to review the following information regarding our current and potential future business relationship into account before we proceed any further in the process.

1. Please get to know me before seriously engaging me. I hope that the reason that you have chosen to engage with me is because of my reputation and the belief that I can be an effective partner. If you are considering me as someone to work with you, please perform due diligence in advance of establishing contact. I have always been an “open book” with regards to who I am, what I do and what I can provide to your company. I have always made my life around technology writing and speaking very transparent. Google me. Ask me questions. Ask yourself if I am a “fit” for your goals. Those few minutes of research will prevent yourself from trying to persuade me to look at, work with or review something that simply makes no sense based upon my interests. I expect that you value your time greatly; please respect the fact that I value my time as well.
2. Please honor (in legality and sprit) any agreements we undertake. I am often asked to sign Non-Disclosure Agreements (“NDAs”) as part of your processes. I have yet to encounter an NDA that does not have some stipulations for the company I am working with. I have and always will treat NDAs with the greatest level of respect; it is something that makes up my “professional integrity”. While you may perceive me as something less, please remember that by requiring a contractual agreement such as an NDA, you are treating me as a business partner. Not only are you legally bound to the contract, your own integrity is at stake in this agreement.
3. Please do not expect me to work with you on “blind faith”. I take the greatest pride in being able to communicate with the public based upon real and tangible knowledge based upon first-hand experience. I consider any sentence that includes “trust us” to be an affront to my professionalism. If you cannot explain why something is or provide me with information, do not expect me to accept that and then pass it along as personally-acquired fact. Furthermore – if we are under an NDA and you feel that you still cannot trust me to honor our agreements, I question whether we should have a relationship in the first place. Furthermore, I find such an attitude professionally and personally insulting and fear that it will introduce emotions into my perceptions of your products that would be unfair to you and (more importantly) those who read and listen to my words expecting an unbiased assessment.
4. Please do not ask me to speak to something when you will not provide the information I need to speak properly. In relation to item #3, please do not ask me to speak or write about something about your product based solely on your word. I am more than happy to post press releases at my web site, but to ask me to advocate or endorse any product without first having experience with the product is a waste of time. Also – please do not ask me to appear at a product launch with your product without first having access to your product. I take my role as a speaker and writer very seriously; the word “credible” means everything to me. There is other form of communication where credibility is more at stake than when in a face-to-face scenario. I will not put my reputation on the line as “knowledgeable”, an “expert” or anything else without being personally comfortable in knowing that I am speaking from direct knowledge and experience.
5. Please refrain from double-standards or “levels of confidentiality” with regards to talking about your product. I respect all legalities surrounding NDAs. I also understand and respect the need for such things as “press embargoes” until specific dates and times. However, please do not put me in a position where others considered as peers are allowed to talk about your product, but not myself. This jeopardizes my relationship with the community-at-large and therefore hurts you as much as me with regards to credibility and effective communication regarding your product. I consider this type of activity to be hypocritical with regards to you as a business partner and will question any further relationship when it happens.
6. Please acknowledge my input/feedback regarding your product. I am intelligent enough to understand that I am but one person of many who may be providing input or feedback regarding your product. Please understand that, after years of being a product tester, I only provide such input in the context of making of improving your product (from my perspective). While I do not expect this input or feedback to necessarily be incorporated, I *do* expect that some acknowledgement of your company at least looking at or considering my input. Non-responsiveness to my communication (which involved taking the time and effort to test/research) delivers a message that the effort is not worthwhile and diminishes our relationship.
   Also – please do not ask for input for a specific release of your product under the guise that the input could be incorporated into your product when this is not the case in reality. I am intelligent enough to figure out when this is the case (and I do quite regularly) and consider this to be disingenuous at best. Once again, this diminishes my trust in your company. If you would like input on a product release but know it cannot be incorporated into the product before release, simply state that fact. I will respect your honesty and be glad to oblige you in any way that I can.
7. Please respect my time. My goal is to always speak to any product or technology based upon real experience. This takes time, often at the expense of other items (personal or professional). Please do not ask me to review or speak to your product in an unreasonable amount of time.
8. Please refrain from asking for “editorial review”. I have not and never will sign any legal agreement that allows you to have editorial review of my written or spoken content. I expect that our relationship (both professional and legal) would allow for us to work in an environment where we can work without the need for censorship. I regularly have offered companies the opportunity to read or hear what I will deliver to the community in advance of the delivery itself. I do so with the hope that anything that is truly inaccurate is caught, as well as providing the professional courtesy of a “heads-up”. While I am a partner, I am not an employee. My credibility is based in large part on my ability to speak freely on subjects. As an side – I will never speak negatively of any product issues in public without first communicating with the company responsible for the product. I believe it is my obligation to first address issues like bugs, features or defects with the company to understand if these items have been already identified and, if so, are they being addressed.

In conclusion, please note that I consider all of the items listed above as proper professional courtesy for any successful business relationship of this nature. I have always taken pride in addressing these types of relationships with the greatest amount of professionalism. All I am asking in return is to be treated with that same level of respect. If you feel that our relationship is anything less than a professional one because of the nature of what I do, I kindly ask you to refrain from any future engagement as such a relationship will never be beneficial to either one of us.       

Sincerely,
Don Sorcinelli

It’s time once again for our monthly Boston/New England Windows Mobile User/Developer Group meeting! This month, our meeting will be held on Wednesday, November 18th starting at 6:30PM at the Microsoft offices in Waltham, MA (201 Jones Road, 6th floor).

This month’s topic -

It’s Off To The Market (place)
Coinciding with the launch of Windows Mobile 6.5, Microsoft has also launched the Windows Marketplace for Mobile. This “one-stop shop” for Windows Phones allows you to browse, purchase and download applications for your device – right from your device!

In this presentation, we will look at the Windows Marketplace for Mobile from both the end-user and developer perspective. We will talk about how to get started, what to consider and what the Windows Marketplace brings to the table.